Old Man Wandering the Roads, and: Except in Memory

Old Man Wandering the Roads

My grandfather grafted trees and sold the shootsacross four counties to farmers who wantednew fruit for canning, an apricot or yellow pear,jar of late autumn to sweeten winter bread.

He left a trail of growing things wherever he went,and carried a little change in his pocketsto prove he had done his day of work,maybe not a lot of it, but enough to get around,

enough to buy gas for an old Ford, Coca-Colafor the road, sardines and saltines for lunch.I remember him as a talker, who visited oftenbut never stayed long, sitting shoulders forward

on our couch, cradling an empty coffee cup,anxious to tell where he'd been that morning,as my father listened with his eyes cast down,trying not to notice split seams and unlaced shoes.

Old man wandering the roads, my mother said,clearing plates and cups once he was gone.And each time my father went outside with himwhen he left, walked him steadily to his truck,

but never came straight back into the house,finding something always to do in the fields,new ground ever to break, a stump to haul away,some old animal always dying and needing buried.

Except in Memory

My father stands by the leaning tobacco barnin the pasture field above our house,shaking mineral salt out of a 50-pound baginto a long iron trough as his herd of white-faced,red-coated Herefords crowd around him.I will not see that scene again, except in memory,and wish I had a photograph of it, or better still,video that shows him parking his pick-upat an angle, 30 feet away from the barn and the cattle.Then he lifts the bag out of the truck bed,throwing it over his shoulder to carry to the crib,and cutting the braided string with a pocketknife.The cows know the sound of his voice—they comewhen he calls, they bob their heads, they lick the salt.